Renewable Energy – Some Major Factors

Renewable energy has turned into a hot topic in the UK, with critics, specialists, and journalists all arguing over the validity of the UK’s shift away from fossil fuels. For consumers, however, the most important thing in this debate is the way it will affect their bottom lines. Will an increasing reliance on renewable energy resources lead to the cheapest electricity available, or will it result in rising utility bills? Unfortunately, there is no clear response to this question, with some contending that consumers will be paying more for renewable energy, while others claim consumers will be paying a lot less. In this article, we will examine both banks of the argument so that you will be able to decide for yourself whether renewable energy is the way to go both for the UK and your own family.

The government’s investment in renewable energy will give rise to family’s having to look deeper into their wallets to cover the extra costs green energy will entail according to the Renewable Energy Foundation. According to their report, the government’s emphasis on green energy will result in the average household paying 600 more per year by 2020, 200 of which will be taken into account through increased bills. The cost could be so great, in fact, that many individuals will have to forgo adequate heating during the winter, and the UK could suffer its first fall in living standards since the early days of the Industrial Revolution. The reason costs will go up is because, according to the report, renewable energy, while enviable from an ecological point of view, is still far more expensive to produce than fossil fuels. As fossil fuel facilities are obliged to close, companies will increasingly have to build on green energy to make up the deficit, but because green energy is still quite expensive, these extra costs will be borne by consumers. Furthermore, UK taxes will be used in order to subsidise green power, while penalising polluters, thus meaning the burden for switching to a green economy will lie with the average UK consumer.

Not everybody is in agreement with the assessment that more and reliance on renewable energy will be a financial strain on UK households. Those who claim that UK consumers will have to devote more because of the switch to green energy fail to take into account the fact that the cost of green energy and green technology has been steadily falling during the years according to the Department of Energy and Climate Change. If these prices continue to fall as expected, then there should be no extra cost borne by UK homeowners. In fact, according to Greenpeace, switching to a green economy will actually help UK households save up to 1600 a year. While investing in green technology will require an initial upfront cost associated with closing fossil fuel plants and replacing them with cleaner forms of electricity generation, such costs will be offset in the long run as renewable energy will be cheaper to produce. Furthermore, as North Sea gas reserves are already beginning to decline quickly, relying on non-renewable sources will inevitably lead to more price hikes as suppliers will have to rely more and more on importing gas and electricity abroad from volatile markets. For consumers, this means that, although the cost of investing in green technology may appear steep at first, it will end up saving them a great deal of money in the long run.

Let’s Go Further

The status quo with green technologies appear to be changing over the past several years. The catalysts for change include falling prices with manufacturing, increased demand as installation costs have steadily fallen and renewed interest in green technology from more mainstream consumers.

Making sure we live environmentally responsible lives is no longer the talk of academics and fringe groups; nowadays renewable energy dictates government policy as well as how much we spend each month on our bills. But as the influence of renewable sources of energy rises, many customers want to find out if such reliance will lead to them getting the cheapest electricity prices. On one side of the segment, critics of renewable energy argue that it is too expensive, and that shutting down cheap fossil fuel facilities for the benefit of expensive solar plants and wind turbines will inevitably result in an increase in average bills. On the other side, proponents of green energy argue that even if the initial cost of renewable resources may be high, they’ll eventually pay for themselves, especially when in relation to the rising cost of conventional resources. UK consumers can be better informed as to to what extent they want to have their homes and communities become more reliant on renewable energy by knowing what the acts are on each side of the argument.